Grounded
by Fireflights
Summary: Hiccup mentions it at breakfast one morning; a passing phrase and nothing more. "Sometimes I wish none of it was real—especially the dragons."


Hiccup asks the question as they lay in their marriage bed.

"Was it all worth it?"

Astrid is laying beside him, their bodies pressed tightly together. He wraps one arm around her, skin sticky from lovemaking. She curls into his touch, pushing her body into his side.

Hiccup is acutely aware of her presence; the way her hair sticks to her skin as well as his, the way her eyes, bluer than the skies they once commanded, watch him with a burning intensity.

She sits up on her elbows, peering down at him. Around her shoulders, her hair falls in golden waves like the great waterfall at the edge of the world.

Anxiety rushes through Hiccup's veins like lightning from a Skrill. Was he good enough? Did he deserve her? Did he deserve any of this?

"I'd say you were pretty good," Astrid says, smiling down at him, a mischievous twinkle in her eye as she peppers kisses along his jaw.

"No, no," Hiccup says, gently pushing his wife away. Confused, she sits back, tilting her head to peer curiously at her husband.

"Then what do you mean, babe?"

"Was… everything worth it?" Hiccup says slowly, struggling to find the right words to explain his jumbled thoughts. "Berk. New Berk. The dragons…"

Astrid's face softens, her hand reaching for his chin. She tilts his head so that he's looking up at her.

The cool night air freezes the sweat against their body, and Hiccup can make out the goosepimples that rise along her arms.

He can see it in her eyes—she doesn't have an answer for him. But she kisses him and holds him as he lies awake through the night. Somehow, that's enough.

xXx

The thoughts stay away for weeks.

It isn't until they are sitting in the newly constructed Mead Hall and New Berk's children are putting on a play of the Battle for New Berk that he feels the emotion creeping up.

Children of various ages are dressed as New Berk's Chief, his riders, and their dragons.

Hiccup watched with hollow eyes and a broken heart as the children run along a wooden stage, growling and waving wooden swords. Finally, the child playing Toothless disappears behind a curtain, vanishing from the wooden "New Berk" and leaving Hiccup aching.

Around him, parents and viewers clap for the performance. The children rush out, waving at their parents and basking in praise. Then, Astrid's elbow is in his side, reminding him of his role.

The Chief of New Berk claps for the children, but Hiccup is somewhere far away.

Astrid turns to him, seeing through his chiefly façade. Her hand, gentle and firm all in one, takes its rightful place in his giving. Giving him a squeeze, he is pulled back to the present.

Hiccup looks up at his wife, her lips parted in an unspoken question.

He stands up, smiles and ruffles the kids' hair as expected as Chief, but then he makes his exit.

Together, they walk to the edge of New Berk where the ocean waits a thousand feet below, hungry and wanting. Before them, it spans for as far as the eye can see, to the edge of the world.

Astrid nudges him, and wrapping his arms around her, things are all right.

xXx

Hiccup mentions it at breakfast one morning; a passing phrase and nothing more.

"Sometimes I wish none of it was real—especially the dragons."

Astrid's head bolts up, eyes squinting at her husband and mouth turning downward in a frown. Their breakfast is forgotten.

"What do you mean?"

Hiccup looks up at her, and Astrid can see the pain behind his eyes. His shoulders drop, as though they can no longer carry the weight of his sadness. Even though he's a chief, he still feels like a useless, fishbone of a boy; the village runt. He wishes he still was.

"They're gone, Astrid. Everything I fought for…everything I believed in…everything I was. I—I just, _Gods_, who am I without them?"

Astrid is at his side in an instant, her arms wrapped around his frame. He has yet to clip the bear-skin cloak to his shoulders, so she can easily swathe her husband in her waiting arms.

"You're a chief. And a husband. And the smartest, bravest, most knuckle-headed guy I know." She soothes, resting her cheek on his head.

Beneath her, he sobs.

xXx

It's worse with the eyes of the tribe on him.

New Berk is just that… new. Even after a year of living on the new island, there is work to be done. Villagers busy their hands with logging, farming, fishing, and other tasks that need to be finished before they can retire to the Mead Hall for libations and rest.

Hiccup, a servant to his people as his father taught him, can often be found in the dirt alongside them. He isn't as strong as the rest of them, but he does his part to build a better home.

As the Vikings work, they make jokes and they tell stories. They talk of the days when Timberjacks cut their forests down and Monstrous Nightmares helped them build their homes.

Hiccup remains silent, but the images of black wings and a wet nose pushing into his hand, fill his mind.

He works until the sun disappears beneath the Earth and his bones yearn for respite. He drags his exhausted body home, and every night, she is there, arms open and smiling at him.

Weary from being landlocked, they make love to feel the rush of flying again.

It's then, curled in his lover's arms, that he says,

"I wish I'd never shot him down."

xXx

Years pass, and the village prospers as it grows. Hiccup takes it all in stride, fearing hardening his heart to the pain he's known. But time makes the ache dull, for the most part.

New Berk is blessed with tall cliffs, and yet, none of them fill Hiccup's heart with the same fondness that flying brought him. But he finds himself drawn to them, nonetheless.

And she's there. Hand in his, firm and sure.

She's always known who she was; with or without dragons. And although he can see she is hurting too, she had adapted in a way he believes he never will.

"Sometimes," He speaks, tongue darting over dry, cracked lips. "Sometimes, I wish I had never met him. I wish none of it had ever happened."

"You don't mean that," She whispered to him.

"No, I don't." He admits, "I wish I did, though. Gods, I wish I wished they weren't real."

On the cliffs, they can feel the wind rushing around them like invisible claws trying to lift them from the ground. Astrid's hair whips around her face, but her expression remains the same; strong and supportive and beautiful and everything he needs. He kisses her. Desperate and scared and sad and wanting, he kisses her.

She's real. As real as Toothless. As real as Berk. As real as the last ten years.

She's real and she's his.

He may never fly again, but with her at his side, he could learn to love the ground.


End file.
